


Prelude

by Nikaty



Category: Vampire: The Masquerade, Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines (Video Game)
Genre: Blood Magic, Blood and Injury, Gen, Mystery, behold my unholy love of the semicolon, bloodlines 2 hype, general vampire business, humanity wearing away, my weird nomad tremere OC
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-02
Updated: 2019-07-30
Packaged: 2020-01-01 07:57:10
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,105
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18331868
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nikaty/pseuds/Nikaty
Summary: All Kindred must understand that there is no true peace, only the calm before the storm.





	1. Chapter 1

A woman was leaning against the car, the lit cigarette between her teeth illuminating her face. A pale thing with straight black hair tucked behind her ears and round sunglasses on the end of her nose, despite the fact it was early morning, and the sky was still solid purple darkness. She wore a ribbed black crop top, slightly baggy jeans and a checked shirt tied around her waist - a simple outfit that was perfectly tailored to her body. Even her boots were scuffed to perfection.  
With her guard down, even an untrained eye could have spotted her for a vampire. 

And it wasn't the black Ankh tattooed on the inside of her right bicep, not even the greyish pallor of her skin, it was the little things that once noticed could not be unseen. Her skin had no goosebumps despite the chill of the night, her body was perfectly still, no twitches, no slight movements that might betray restless human muscles. As the cigarette burned away, she didn't breathe in its acrid smoke, didn't breathe at all. 

"Fuck you look gloomy, Len." Kaidan was approaching the car, carrying bags stuffed with food and a titanic bottle of Coke under their arm. Len had stopped cringing at her name a long time ago, a momentary lapse in judgment when she had decided that Lenore was the most vampiry thing she could think of, but she still wished she'd had the presence of mind to change it when she left L.A.  
"Get everything?" Having once been the victim of health-freak parents, Kaidan had embraced their new-found freedom by binging snack foods at every opportunity, insisting that their Ghoul body could endure the trans fats they unleashed upon it. Raising her eyebrows at the tube of 'Wingles Potato-Like Discs' poking out of the bag, Len wasn't so sure. 

Len stepped away from the car so Kaidan could put everything onto the passenger seat, so they could munch as they drove. She moved further into the darkness. Though she could see the gas station, she was too far for anyone there to see her. They had chosen a more isolated road, a family owned gas station that wasn't as well lit as more popular ones, but she was regretting this decision; there was no one else around which meant there was a better chance of them being remembered if anyone came around asking questions. In her first year she had been constantly aware of eyes on her: that incident with LaCroix and the sarcophagus, the fact that she was a Tremere more at home standing shoulder to shoulder with the Anarchs than at the bottom of the pyramid - worse still she had been a sireless fledgling proving herself capable in a scrap and that made her as dangerous as she was interesting. She had loved the attention. Now she feared it. 

She felt nothing watching her now, apart from Kaidan, their genuine concern slightly irritating her, but since their bond was her own fault she didn't let her feelings show.  
Len stubbed the smoldering cigarette under her boot and turned back to the car before something at the gas station caught her eye.  
Kindred senses grew stronger over time, inevitably. Supernaturally improved, but not unbelievably so, not without effort. In her first few years she had been only slightly more observant than the average human. 

She was older now. Her sight sharper. 

The attendant watched her as she approached; their window on the left side of the door was clear giving them a perfect view of the lot, but the right side was covered in fliers and posters, stuck all over one another so their messages were meaningless. And the old ones advertising events long since past or bands probably broken up by now were nearly hidden by two dozen missing persons fliers. Faces of people, some smiling in candid shots but more taken from school and college pictures stared at her, advising when they went missing, basic features and who to call. 

The first thing to stand out was the fact that twenty of these people had all been reported missing in the past month. They varied, some clearly in their teens others seemingly close to retirement. The second thing was that one was actually a poor-quality print out of a word document with some pictures dragged onto the page, pixelated and greyscale. They looked like they were video stills, the camera below the normal line of sight, but even then Len recognised the faces there. The memory washed over her with the faint scent of salty air, a smokey fire on the sand and desperation.  
E and Lily, the star-crossed and seriously annoying thin-bloods she had met on the beach in Santa Monica nearly 15 years ago.  
Len laughed sharply in surprise at the sight of them, rearing it in when she saw the attendant sit up to look at her.  
They hadn't aged, because they couldn't, but even without a colour photo Len could tell there was something different about them, something in their eyes that had changed.  
She ripped the contact info, an address and home telephone number off the flier, and went back to the car, a fanged grin on her face and interest in her eyes. Kaidan was sitting in the drivers seat with the door open and their legs hanging out the side, watching her. 

"What's up?" 

"Something strange is going on. We're getting into it." Kaidan's eyes widened, their hand paused in a bag of marshmallows. 

"Don't you think it's a bit soon? We barely got away from those hunters last week you know. Despite you telling me that everything was fine..." they added, bitterly, but Len wasn't really listening. 

"How long until sunrise?" Kaidan impulsively reached for their pocket, but since smart phones were now verboden there was nothing there. Instead they checked their watch and a sheet of paper with dates and numbers on it. 

"Just over four hours." 

"Excellent." 

Without saying anything else Len went into the trailer which was attached to the car. There was a slight pulse over her skin as she passed over a ward; though unseen the trailer was covered in them. The sigils had taken her over a year to perfect; rather than causing pain or a conspicuous injury those trespassers who tried to cross would just find themselves overwhelmed with dread, and unless they had balls of steel, they would come up with some excuse to avoid going any further. It had helped her in more than a few searches in the past, and not once had anyone suspected anything strange of her personally. 

Strauss had once told her that rejecting the pyramid would be the death of her but she would like to see any of those bastards come up with a good idea that didn't get someone's fucking eyes burned out or tie their veins in knots in the process. 

The trailer was cramped; she had pulled out the double bed and replaced it with a sort of mini-alchemy lab; Tupperware stained red and old plastic bottles filled with various liquids, ancient tomes in Ziploc bags in some attempt to preserve them and a desk lamp pilfered from some moving in boxes left on the street for a moment, a clever move on Kaidan's part. 

If anyone did make in into the trailer Len would be lucky if she wasn't shot on sight. Even without the suspect lab, the small fridge had bagged blood right next the semi-skimmed milk and the bottom bunk was shrouded in thick drapes, the windows painted and covered with black garbage bags. Crammed into every free space there were fake IDs, little notebooks full of interesting things Len and Kaidan had picked up, few of them legal, a stolen handgun was stashed alongside the cutlery and there was an unregistered shotgun in the bathroom. 

Even if a trespasser was skeptical enough to rule out 'vampire den', psycho killer wasn't an unfair assumption. 

Wasn't technically wrong either. 

Len cut off a piece of pure white ribbon from the spool that had seemed to last for an eternity. This was old thaumaturgy, a technique she was using more often now that Kindred were afraid of the internet. She dropped the ribbon into one of those portable soup bowls with the handles, placed it on top of a well worn map of the US and made a neat slice along her wrist with the only one of her finger nails she hadn't bitten off - what Kaidan lovingly called her coke nail.  
Blood spattered into the bowl and when the ribbon was completely doused Len licked her wrist, a twinge going down her arm but the wound was closed and she licked up the remains of the blood on her skin. Not satisfying, and annoyingly it made her a bit peckish. She lit a match, feeling that spark of power right in her chest and dropped it into the bowl. The flame caught, burning more red than orange and there was nothing left but ashes within a few minutes. Len sliced her tongue with her fang, tipped the ashes into her mouth and swirled the concoction around. The texture was foul but there was no taste, which she was thankful for. She thought of Lily, tried to perfectly picture the way her hair had sat and the depressed scowl that had been fixed on her pretty face when Len had spoken to her.  
She spat in onto the map of the United States, wising she could do some damage to the real fuckin' thing too. 

The mixture absorbed into the paper until there was nothing left. Then, glowing like the flame had, an X appeared on the map and the sensation burned through Len's veins. She could feel the path before her, could have found the right roads with her eyes closed. She stared at the X for several seconds before laughing-loudly- a little crazily.  
She got out of the trailer. The night air was cold, the stars in hiding. When she glanced back at the gas station she could feel the anxiety and lethargy of the attendant within.  
A real fucking beautiful night. What a time to be undead.

Kaidan buckled their seat belt at the sight of her, all serious servitude. Satisfaction surged through Len at the sight. Her faithful little follower. 

"Where to?" 

"All arrows point to Seattle. Hope you like seafood."  
\------------------  
Kaidan started driving again just as Len was hunkering down for the day in her bunk, not sleepy but knowing she could rest as soon as she chose. How typical shit was hitting the fan in Seattle, the exact place Len had been avoiding for the entirety of her life as a Kindred, and as much as possible when she was Kine. Maybe you really couldn't go home again, but at least your lifeless corpse could haunt the place.  
Small comfort. 

Kaidan rubbed their eyes, tired and wired from all the sugar, caffeine and the fact their sleep cycle had yet to adjust to a nocturnal life. But their body was better now, they wouldn't have to sleep, not for another day or two if necessary.  
Still, awake did not mean alert, and if Kaidan had been less green they might have known what to look for, might have seen the signs. Maybe they would have noticed the sleek black Bentley that followed behind them.


	2. A Note

Hi, I wanted to thank everybody who read, commented and gave kudos to this fic before, it was really encouraging!  
Unfortunately I've decided to give up on this fanfic since I'm no longer happy with the direction I've taken the story and have no interest in finishing it so sorry to anyone still reading it.   
However, I have really taken to the characters in this, as well as some of the plot threads which I would have had a hard time tying up if I was writing just one big fic, which is why I'm instead going to write a series of smaller, much more focused works which still have Len and Kaidan at the heart. These fics will really just focus on singular 'missions' and moments for them, some based directly on the game, which tie in together but can mostly be read standalone. I think this will help me create the stories for Len I wanted to when I first started writing about her, and will also be easier for me to actually keep writing and updating.  
Thanks again for checking out this fic and I hope you'll be interested in what I write next

**Author's Note:**

> So this is just a little idea I've been bouncing around as I'm replaying the game and with Bloodlines 2 coming out I thought it might be a good time to post actually get writing. 
> 
> This is my first fic in a looooong time so Id really appreciate feedback, tell me what you think!


End file.
